Tapetheradio - Stay Inside

Label: Too Pure
Release date: 14/12/09
Website: http://www.myspace.com/tapetheradio
Londoners Tapetheradio (often typeset as the shout TAPETHERADIO) mastered their new single at historic Abbey Road Studios, are poised to be the new NME darlings, and have a popular Twitter account. By all means, itâs going in their direction. Well, it would be going their way if they didnât sound like a collection of cleverly chosen ripoffs.
From the delay guitar, tight snare, and buoyant bass, the...

Label: Too Pure
Release date: 14/12/09
Website:http://www.myspace.com/tapetheradio
Londoners Tapetheradio (often typeset as the shout TAPETHERADIO) mastered their new single at historic Abbey Road Studios, are poised to be the new NME darlings, and have a popular Twitter account. By all means, itâs going in their direction. Well, it would be going their way if they didnât sound like a collection of cleverly chosen ripoffs.
From the delay guitar, tight snare, and buoyant bass, the hope for maybe a new take on The Cureâs sound wafts, like a carrot on a string. âYou paved the way for my heart/it gets lonely/you shade the dust from my eyes,â whines M.C. under a blanket of effects. The song follows the conventional build up of a song, then breaks for a line for dramatic effect, builds up to a bridge, then ends on a chorus. All in fewer than three minutes, too! Wesley Willis would be proud of their frugality. B-side âKeep Talkingâ fares slightly better, with a dronier guitar (but the lead riff is âWave of Mutilationâ in a different key) and disco-pattern drums for the chorus, but again you get sub par Cure and Franz Ferdinand sounds. Masses of handclaps, group vocals, and even audience participatory âHey!âs just make the song stale and outdated despite its recent release date. Maybe itâs the ennui of so many chirpy Britpop bands, or the thought of another band that sounds like The Cure, or the fact that Tapetheradio sounds like a bootleggerâs band, but the songs presented are not just less than the sum of their parts, theyâre just plain boring.
After listening to their single a half dozen times, I can conclusively say three things: 1.) This band can do something good, if they can mask their influences a little more. 2.) This band will be popular because they sound like other bands, so people will be drawn to that. 3.) This single is not a grower. You like it or you donât. Personally, it does nothing for me. I hate to trash this since itâs like a debut single, but itâs just plain dull. Iâll spin their first album to see if they got better, but for now theyâre just another band from London.
Rating: 5/10